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2011 – Freedom’s Frontier in the Flint Hills Symphony in the Flint Hills Field Journal (Laurie J. Hamilton, Editor)

The Border War and American Liberty

Nicole Etcheson

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This is brought to you for free and open access by the Conferences at New Prairie Press. It has been accepted for inclusion in Symphony in the Flint Hills Field Journal by an authorized administrator of New Prairie Press. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Border War and American Liberty Hanging in a corner of the Kansas state Capitol building in Topeka is John Steuart Curry’s mural “The Tragic Prelude.” A wild-eyed, bearded John Brown, arms out-stretched, clutches a Sharps rifle in one hand and the Bible in another. On either side of him, armed men advance toward each other. One side carries the Union flag, and the other, the Confederate flag.

A dead soldier from each army lies picture, John Brown is central to the at Brown’s feet. On Brown’s left, a slave conflict. Secondly, the repeated Union/

THE TRAGIC PRELUDE mother and child crouch in the shadows Confederate imagery drives home that John Steuart Curry while a black man grapples with a southern the Kansas-Missouri border war instigated Kansas State Historical Society soldier. In the background, a tornado the national Civil War. Finally, African- touches ground and a prairie fire sweeps Americans are peripheral figures in the across the plains as if the fury of nature story---almost hidden from view behind itself has been set loose by Brown’s frenzy. both Brown and the white Southerners. Curry’s painting makes several The abolitionist John Brown certainly statements about the war on the Kansas- played a role in the Border War. The Missouri border in the 1850s. First, with murders of five proslavery settlers in his over-sized figure that dominates the 1856 by Brown’s men helped set off the

11 fighting in Kansas Territory that summer. for whites might require a greater measure won by majorities of 5,000-6,000. Because from other States.” Immigrants from the But Brown was an anomaly among Free- of liberty for African-Americans. the elections were in the spring, many Midwest and New England, however, state Kansans. First, he was a genuine Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas Missourians who expected to move into complained their rights had been violated. abolitionist and known for equality in his intended to widen the scope of American the territory later in the season felt justified Confronted by armed and often drunken treatment of African-Americans. liberty when he authored the Kansas- in voting even though they were not yet “border ruffians” (as the Missourians were In contrast, while the Free-state Nebraska Act in 1854. To gain support residents. They crossed the border and known), northern settlers often refrained movement certainly contained anti- of southern Congressmen, Douglas voted on Election Day because they felt that from voting or were harassed at the polls. slavery men, it included many racists who replaced the prohibition against slavery Kansas Territory was a natural extension Those settlers who were outraged by the objected to slavery as competitive labor in the proposed territories of Kansas and of Missouri and resented what they saw as irregularity of the elections organized to and who preferred segregation. To appeal Nebraska with a provision called “popular interference in their affairs by outsiders oppose the proslavery territorial government to these settlers, many of whom were sovereignty.” The concept meant that from other regions. One such voter asserted that had been elected, and instead formed Midwesterners, the Free-state movement the settlers, not Congress, would decide “they had as good a right to vote as men an extra-legal Free-state movement. adopted the prohibitions against black whether to have slavery in the territory. migration into Kansas contained in Douglas expounded this as “the great the laws and constitutions of several principle of self-government, upon which Midwestern states. Rather than argue for our institutions were originally based.” universal human rights, the Free-staters Douglas’s simple formula that popular mobilized support on the grounds that sovereignty was merely American democracy the political rights of white men had been proved difficult in execution. In fact, loose denied by proslavery men. residency requirements and rampant fraud During an 1856 fight, James H. Lane, were problems in nineteenth-century one of the Free-state militia leaders, elections. They became particularly returned a slave to his master saying, “We egregious in Kansas Territory. Although the are not fighting to free black men but to territorial census found only about 3,000 free white men.” Nonetheless, the Free- voters in the territory, proslavery candidates RUINS OF THE FREE-STATE HOTEL, LAWRENCE staters understood that ensuring liberty at the territorial election a month later Kansas State Historical Society

12 13 Throughout the territorial period, Free- It normalized slavery by removing the in the Declaration and embodied in the staters would argue that the proslavery party prohibition against it. It dehumanized American Revolution were at odds with John Steuart Curry may had thwarted popular sovereignty. They African-Americans and denied them the Kansas-Nebraska Act. have been wrong in making would demand fair elections. the inalienable rights granted in the While Lincoln captured the concerns John Brown the central Others, however, disagreed with the Declaration of Independence. Further, of many white Northerners, white figure of Bleeding Kansas, very premise of popular sovereignty. The Lincoln asserted that popular sovereignty’s Southerners insisted that their rights Kansas-Nebraska Act resuscitated the “pretended indifference” about whether but he was not wrong to were under attack. The latter pointed dormant political career of Abraham settlers voted for or against slavery capture the importance of out that the results of the territorial Lincoln, a Whig lawyer and old rival disguised a “covert real zeal for the spread the territory in bringing on elections were certified by the proper of Douglas. Lincoln viewed popular of slavery.” Lincoln insisted that the authorities. Although some Southerners the Civil War. sovereignty as a disastrous public policy. spirit of American liberty as articulated were repelled by the extent of fraud in territorial elections, others defended the 1857, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Missourians. Since the proslavery party the case of a Missouri slave, Dred Scott, controlled the territorial government, it that slavery could not be excluded from portrayed itself as the party of law and the territories. This invalidated both order in contrast to the extra-legal, possibly the policy of congressional exclusion

treasonous, Free-state party. Territorial and Douglas’ popular sovereignty. The surveyor general John Calhoun told a Richmond Enquirer explained that the meeting of the Law and Order Party, “If decision meant the territories were the the laws are unconstitutional, they must be “common domain of all the United States, repealed at the proper tribunal. Until they and, as such, the people of each and every are repealed, they are the law of the land State have an irrefutable right to transfer and should be enforced.” themselves and their property into it.” For But white Southerners abandoned white Southerners, liberty now meant the MISSOURI BORDER RUFFIANS ENTERING KANSAS popular sovereignty altogether when a constitutional right to enslave African- TO VOTE FOR SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORY Kansas State Historical Society more favorable alternative appeared. In Americans in the territories.

14 15 Douglas based popular sovereignty in by the Border War to strike for freedom. the democratic traditions of the United The very fact that Free-state leader Jim States. Lincoln took his text from the Lane returned a slave to his master Declaration of Independence. White following escape indicates that slaves were Southerners relied on the Constitution. not content under slavery. This slave John Brown, however, cited the Bible. miscalculated whether Lane’s band would Curry’s mural captured Brown’s help him, but he was not alone in seeking ultimate source with his stance evoking to “self-emancipate.” The disorder of images of a crucifix. Unlike the other Bleeding Kansas and the national Civil parties quarreling, Brown cared nothing War presented many slaves with the about the legal and constitutional opportunity to run away successfully. The arguments. The Bible, Brown avowed, town of Lawrence became a notorious teaches one to “remember them that are refuge for runaway slaves. in bonds, as bound with them.” Northern The Free-state party gradually came to and southern whites spoke of the rights see their freedom intertwined with slave of white men. Brown spoke of the rights freedom. Charles Robinson, an important COLONEL SUMNER AND TROOPS DISPERSING THE of the enslaved. Condemned to hang Free-state politician and the first governor FREE-STATE LEGISLATURE IN TOPEKA, JULY 4, 1856 Kansas State Historical Society for attempting to lead a Virginia slave of Kansas, pondered during the secession rebellion, Brown was willing to “mingle my crisis whether “it is time to ask if the blood ---with the blood of millions in this existence of the Union does not require slave country whose rights are disregarded the destruction of slavery.” Jim Lane, who by wicked, cruel, and unjust enactments.” became a Kansas U.S. senator, changed Few members of the Free-state party positions. Lane now recruited African- or their northern supporters were Americans into the Union army—before abolitionists. But African-Americans the War Department allowed for black certainly seized the opportunity presented troops—and promoted their rights. He did

16 17 to act. Robinson, in turn, viewed Brown John Brown, although an imperfect as too eager to start a conflict with the representation of the Border War, at least superior proslavery forces who had backing captured the transformation that occurred by the federal government. Although many as more Free-staters adopted the cause of Free-staters resented the leading role that racial justice, if not for moral reasons, then historians and the public gave to Brown in for pragmatic ones. Kansas’s last territorial the history of Kansas Territory, Brown’s governor, Samuel Medary, feared that fame overshadowed that of other figures Kansas would “go forth as a Black Old in the territory’s history. “A Centennial John Brown state.” In the 1870s, African- Portrait” of Kansas written in 1961 began Americans fled the violent collapse of a list of famous Kansans with “Kansas is Reconstruction and made Kansas their John Brown, Charles Robinson, James H. destination precisely because they saw it THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD Lane. . . .” With good reason, everyone on as John Brown’s home. While Curry saw Charles T. Webber Cincinnati Art Museum the list might feel slighted at Brown being African-Americans in the background so in part to punish slave-owners for the Brown exploited his capture to become a named first. of the Border War, these Exodusters war couching his appeals in racist terms. martyr for abolition. The controversy over John Steuart Curry may have been understood John Brown and Kansas

He stated that during Bleeding Kansas, his actions was an immediate contributor wrong in making John Brown the central Territory to be central to their story of Free-staters “learned the colored possessed to secession and national civil war. But his figure of Bleeding Kansas, but he was American liberty. the qualities of the soldier.” very abolitionism and concern for black not wrong to capture the importance Nicole Etcheson is Alexander M. Bracken Better known than Robinson and rights made him an anomaly in the Free- of the territory in bringing on the Civil Professor of History at Ball State University Lane, John Brown used his reputation as state movement. As the Free-staters became War. Curry was wrong to depict African- in Muncie, Indiana. She is the author of Bleeding Kansas: Contested Liberty in the a guerrilla leader in Bleeding Kansas to more sympathetic to slaves’ rights, however, Africans as helpless and cowering. He was Civil War Era (Lawrence, 2004) and The raise eastern support for a proposed slave Brown’s early career in Kansas helped not wrong, however, in depicting African- Emerging Midwest: Upland Southerners and the Political Culture of the Old Northwest, insurrection in Virginia. Brown rose to obscure the movement’s initial ambivalence Americans on the periphery, where they 1787-1861 (Bloomington, 1996). Her book A national attention when this attack on about race. Brown had once denounced were relegated by the indifference of white Generation at War: The Civil War Era in a Northern Community will be published by the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry failed. Robinson as an old woman, too afraid Americans to slavery and racial injustice. University Press of Kansas in 2011.

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